As I hear the sound of the obnoxious whistle screech like the fire alarms the game stops I shake my head knowing. Knowing I fouled out of the game. In disbelief I walk to the bench and as my coach is telling me it’s alright we still have a minute left in the game. Sitting on the cold bench knowing I now can’t change the outcome of the game. Sitting there in the boiling gym and watching the game was like watching tv in black in white without sound. Just sitting because you can’t do anything else about it besides cheering on your team and hoping for the best possible outcome.

As the time hits zero with the final score being 76-74 we all shake our heads in disappointment. After watching the other team celebrate their championship win. One of the most devastating things to do in sports is to go all the way to the finals and lose to a team. Especially when you know your team is better than the team you just lost to. You feel disappointed in yourself because you never want to lose any game and the championship games are even harder to lose.  The opposing coach comes up to us telling us what a game we had. We all walked to the corner to hear the coach's postgame speech. Sweat dripped from all of us. You would think we just got out of a pool. This place was hotter than any summer day imaginable, as we threw our bags down. We sat down dead silent as you could only hear the sounds of the other team celebrating. Jumping up and down on the hardwood floor hearing thud thud thud as they jump around. All dead staring at the ground thinking and thinking. As the coach comes to talk to us you would think something crazy happened because he was jubilant he was acting like he just won the lottery. We were all in confusion as we sat there at a tent waiting to see why he was smiling. You would think we just won the tournament the way he was acting. It was the craziest thing I had ever seen, especially after losing a heartbreaking game like that one.

Coach breaks the silence and says “I don’t think you understand how proud I am of you guys you hung with a bunch of 16 and 15 year olds.” Only losing by two to a team like that was pretty cool to think about. He tells us we only have one practice a week; they most likely have practice everyday or every other day. Most of the teams I have played for normally do practice everyday. But we have to work hard on different days when we don’t have practice to help us get better so we can beat teams like that. That team doesn’t just show up and they are a great team. They lift weights and they play an hour or two each day because they learned what hard work is. The last thing he said after the game was “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.” None of us really let that sink on us until after. I take off my shoes before walking over to get a picture for the parents. The grippy floor becomes slick as I slide over to get a picture still sad with the outcome of the game.

While I look at the same trophy we just but with just a different sticker the fake plastic has a glare and it bounces and hits me in the face blinding me. But winning the tournament isn’t just about getting the plastic trophy, it's about getting better to get the trophy and having fun while doing it.  As we all gather around to take our runner up trophy and our photo. We all just started laughing because we realized they were 16 and 15 bigger than us and could hardly beat a bunch of 13 and 14 year olds.  All still covered in sweat trying to stand by the cooling fan it felt like when you jump into the pool for the first time on a hot summer day. We knew when we would play them again we would beat them because we nearly did the first time why could we beat them the second time through. It is always better to beat a team when they have better players than you but they don’t work like one. When we walked out of the gym, cool air whacked us and started to slowly cool us down. All of us were still a little annoyed and frustrated. We all had a good feeling. Nobody knew what it was but you could tell everyone of us could feel it. It felt like we really won because we all knew that coming out of that game only losing by two was huge. This lost may seem like a setback and it was. It didn’t set us back that far because it was a confidence booster. It let us know that we can run with nearly any team no matter how big they may be because we play our own style of basketball. 

In the car on the way home what coach said “hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard.” It finally started to resonate with me. The sense of realization that we all need to work hard to not let the person next to us that may have been working hard. While one was slacking off. Just that alone changed my whole concept of working hard because someone may be better than you but you may work harder than them you will end up being better than them or make it further than them. I will never forget this moment because of the lesson I learned. I learned that if you want something you have to go and get it. If you don't, someone else will. It was a blessing in disguise losing that game because I now know what hard work really is from this experience even though I didn’t truly like this moment. It taught me more than what the score of the game did.